Coldplay, Hampden Park, Glasgow review - a pop spectacle for all ages

★★★ COLDPLAY, HAMPDEN PARK, GLASGOW A pop spectacle for all ages

The indie band's transformation into wild stadium pop is complete

It is a testament to Coldplay’s capacity for reinvention that a good portion of this stadium crowd were not even born when the band first broke through over two decades ago. Such an age range in the audience clearly caught the eye of Chris Martin, who, in a rare moment of standing still, dryly noted that he owns trousers older than some of the people singing along.

The End of Eddy, Edinburgh International Festival 2022 review - powerful but lacking compassion

★★★THE END OF EDDY, EIF 2022 Powerful but lacking compassion

An energetic, lithe gig-theatre adaptation of Édouard Louis’s 2014 trauma memoir can't escape the book's limitations

Those working-class people really are appalling, aren’t they? Racist, sexist, definitely homophobic, violent too. Thank god our young hero can escape their clutches into the safety of a nice, bourgeois acting academy where he can be his true self.

Edinburgh Fringe 2022 review: The Stones

★★★★ THE STONES A slow-burn gothic horror plays with our sense of reality to intelligently creepy effect

A slow-burn gothic horror plays with our sense of reality to intelligently creepy effect

In many ways, The Stones is what the Fringe is all about: a new theatre company (London-based Signal House); a single actor; a small black-box space; just a chair, a bit of smoke and some almost imperceptible lighting changes for a staging. And with those modest ingredients, it generates a work that’s really quite unnerving in its quiet power, and magpie-like in its references.

Prom 42, Lisiecki, BBC Scottish SO, Dausgaard review - concerto partnership made in heaven

★★★★ PROM 42, LISIECKI, BBCSSO, DAUSGAARD Concerto partnership made in heaven

Lisiecki electrifies in Beethoven, but well-prepared Nielsen doesn’t quite storm the heights

Sibelius or Nielsen symphonies? Last night, with the Finn’s Seventh in the first half and the Dane’s “Inextinguishable” (No. 4) in the second, choice should have been impossible. Francesco Piemontesi or Jan Lisiecki? I’d have been equally happy with either pianist, but there we had no option: PIemontesi was unwell and the Canadian took over. The Beethoven Fourth Piano Concerto we heard as a result was fresh and electifying.

Chineke! Chamber Ensemble / Martineau & Osborne / SCO, Marshall, Edinburgh International Festival 2022 review - great musicians, not always great music

Quality playing, but the content didn't always match the execution

What happens when great musicians play weak music? I couldn’t help but think about that while I listened to the musicians of Chineke! Chamber Ensemble (★★) on Friday morning in Edinburgh’s Queen’s Hall. Chineke! was founded to provide opportunities for black and ethnically diverse classical musicians, so it’s a logical step for them also to promote music written by non-white composers, too. I wish they’d picked better music than what they played in this Edinburgh International Festival programme, though.

Counting and Cracking, Edinburgh International Festival 2022 review - ambitious, powerful, but sadly under-attended

★★★★★ COUNTING AND CRACKING, EIF 2022 Ambitious, powerful, but sadly under-attended

A multi-layered, multi-generational theatrical epic is one of this year's stand-out offerings

First, a bit of housekeeping. Maybe it was the three-and-a-half-hour duration, or maybe the unfamiliar Sri Lankan subject matter, or maybe even the very un-festival-like hot weather that put people off an evening inside Edinburgh’s Lyceum Theatre. Or maybe (very possibly) continuing Covid concerns.

Shetland, Series 7, BBC One review - Douglas Henshall is back for the last time as Jimmy Perez

★★★ SHETLAND, SERIES 7, BBC ONE Can new series recapture the show's former glories?

Can new series recapture the show's former glories?

The last couple of series of Shetland (BBC One) brought the previously much-loved series alarmingly close to shark-jumping territory, converting the remote and thinly-populated Shetland archipelago into a war zone teeming with people-trafficking gangs, murderers and drug dealers. Can Series 7 restore some sanity?

Edinburgh Fringe 2022 reviews: Temping / Work.txt

Two performer-less shows on the theme of work set the audience to - well, work

Temping, Assembly George Square Studios

Sarah Jane is away in Hawaii. But don’t worry – she’s left plenty of instructions for your day temping in the actuaries’ office, checking voicemails, answering emails, updating spreadsheets. After all, it’s just numbers – it’s not like you’ll be dealing with people’s lives or anything.